Repugs Hate Government Services Unless They Can Make A Profit on Them

The problem for them, of course, is that there is no public service that private companies can provide more effectively and more cheaply than government can. 

So for forty years, corporations and their repug knob-gobblers have been demonizing government and lying about what government does in order to grab fat sweetheart contracts that pay them billions to provide no services, thus pissing off taxpayers who blame government and allow more services to be privatized.

Even in the case of a service that private utilities have promised for more than 20 years to provide and failed spectacularly, the privatizers and their cheerleaders are fighting against public service.

Tom Eblen at the Herald:

A year after state officials created a nationally recognized public-private partnership to build America’s best statewide broadband network, opponents are trying to kill it.

Some telecom and cable companies that now provide Internet service around the state, along with several right-wing advocacy groups, are pushing legislators and Gov. Matt Bevin to rethink the project, called KentuckyWired.

KentuckyWired was created as part of the Shaping Our Appalachian Region initiative organized by former Gov. Steve Beshear, a Democrat, and U.S. Rep. Hal Rogers, a Republican from Somerset and chairman of the House Appropriations committee.

The high-speed, fiber-optic network is to be managed and ultimately paid for by private industry. But it will be owned by the public and offer open access to any Internet service provider.

KentuckyWired officials say this network and its innovative structure could be a boon for economic development, giving businesses and homes better service, more choice and more competitive prices.

Independent studies have given Kentucky low rankings nationally for broadband availability, service and cost.

But AT&T has filed a protest over the state’s process for awarding school Internet service contracts, many of which it now has. The Kentucky Telecom Association, which represents 15 rural Internet providers, thinks KentuckyWired should be reconsidered, claiming it would duplicate existing infrastructure and undermine existing businesses that need their state and school service contracts.

Yeah, that would be the same AT&T that put high-fiber line in my front yard 15 years ago but still claims they can't get DSL to my house.  The same AT&T you hear people cursing as they fail to get service on their smart phones.  The same AT&T that has people cancelling their Direct TV in droves since AT&T bought it.

Government-provided broadband would be state-of-the-art and affordable, words not in the vocabulary of AT&T, Verizon, Sprint, T-mobile or any other private corporation currently stealing money from customers and giving no service in return.

But don't worry, corporations: Our "libertarian" governor is probably cancelling KentuckyWired as I write.

Read more here: http://www.kentucky.com/news/local/news-columns-blogs/tom-eblen/article56259250.html#storylink=cpy